Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1887-07-09
THE SMALL BOYS DAY,
And How He Celebrates 1t with Fire
and Noise.

And How He Celebrates 1t with Fire
and Noise.
And thus the editor muses.: Why the fra.
cracker9 Why, indeed, the stridulous small
boy, who, with ventilated apparel, one sus-
pender and unsandaled feet, accompanies the
firecraeker in Is orbit of flannel Why
pop and fzz on the Fourth more
than any othera Why then more than
any other time doth the small bow
rage and grow insolent, and touch off
everything that hath noise in it, from paper
torpedo to fish horn, and brighten horses
and get asleep on curbstones, and tear his
trousers and burn his eyebrows, and do vari-
Gus other dreadful things for which he has
been called to account ever since he came in
vogue? What relation has the firecracker to
the Declaration of Independence Or what
the horse frightening, bowling small boyl
The one is Chinese invention that has no
earthly Specification beyond sputter and fizz;
the other has but faint idea Of what the
Declaration he is trying to glorify means.
He is. in truth, the most absolutely depend
emit creature in nature.
who started this combination of youth and
saltpeter of vocal haircloth and the limbs Of
the jumping jack, of fire, fizzle and bangl
It is laid at John Adams door because he
said something about the ringing of bells, the
firing of cannon, etc. But could he have
taken the small boy into account when he
said it, Did he dream of the annual nerve
racking tumult he was preparing for future
penerationsi Had he any idea that Fourth
Of July celebrations would so generally be- car
ried on, or at least aggravated, by small boys
of extraordinary lung power and never fal-
tering energyi Impossiblel John Adams
was a noble man, q patriot, statesman, but
he was not In all things a clairvoyant. He
could not look forward and see the small
boy Of 1887 celebrating the Fourth Of
July to the terror and peril Of his
seniors. The toy pistol was not in
vogue In John Adams day, nor had
the fire cracker obtained afoothold on Amer.
lean soil Dogs with explosives tied to their
tails entered not Mr.. Adams idea of celebrat-
ing. All these have come in with other mod
ern implements Of torture until we now have
day which powder and the small boy claim
for their own.
Noise and happiness, patriotic enthusiasm
and Chinese crackers are convertible terms
The small boy seizes the Fourth OF July as
his own, and custom has handed it over TO
him to do as he pleases with it. He is so
afraid that somebody else will claim even the
smallest fraction of it that he begins to take
possession on the evening of the 3D. Hesits
up all night in order to "usher in the day
with the loudest racket he can produce.
He brings noises to the front the
moment the midnight hour arrives
and from that on until midnight comes
again he accompanies himself with fire
fame, conclusion and reverberation. Little
H. hot ind fc ttyaar
tiers, mutilation of his body, and trouble with
his stomach All those things are for his
elders to look after and make right.
He has now had over a century of this sort
of thing and shows no signs Of getting tired
of it. And the firecracker multiples and
grows upon u.s. In the provincial towns It is
mitigated by professions, orations, municipal
demonstrations, lemonade, gingerbread and
spruce beer. But in the city the firecracker
RACES without mitigation.
These remarks the small boy will not like
But the day will come when he will admit
the force OF them. That day will be whenhe
has passed out of small boyhood into what no
now calls "fogyism," otherwise full grown
and possibly middle aged citizenship. He
will then occasionally remark that "all is
vanity, aye, even glory and frecrackers.n
And his sons viii laugh in their sleeves and
speak of him as "the old man," and decide
that he has forgotten his youth. The dow
and freshness of the dawn OF life will be over
for him, and with him will go his former
close appreciation Of Fourth Of July explo-
sives Sometimes he will hear himself re-
ferred to as "old Wil1insn-if Wilkins is his
name--and 1t will give him queer and moi
at ell pleasant sensation.
In view OF all this we must bear patiently
with the small boy and bis extravagantly ex-
plosive patriotism. 1t will have its end, like
all earthly things, and in its train will come
no end Of responsibilities, ambitions, griey-
ances and vexations, and the rheumatism
and mental dyspepsia; and-who knows2-per-
haps we win occasionally look on the small
boy and his firecrackers with envy.